8 students I know personally have tested positive (two have lost immediate family members, but outside Brazos County). Whatever the decision is to keep TAMU open or not in the fall, if students don't feel safe being in crowded situations with a highly contagious and uncontrolled virus on the loose, then it's reasonable to expect many won't return physically to BCS.
Crompton's predictions about TAMU
23,915 Views |
137 Replies |
Last: 3 yr ago by Cholula Verde
If A&M loses the revenues from the dorms, parking, cafeteria, MSC sales, football sales, some student fees and combine that with th elost revenues from Texas state lands oil revenues, there will be severe budget freezes and RIF's in the Fall.
Too many people don't care about the economic harm, no matter how bad it ends up being.woodiewood1 said:
If A&M loses the revenues from the dorms, parking, cafeteria, MSC sales, football sales, some student fees and combine that with th elost revenues from Texas state lands oil revenues, there will be severe budget freezes and RIF's in the Fall.
They literally live by the phrase "if it saves just 1 life, it is worth it."
"If you will not fight for right when you can easily win without blood shed; if you will not fight when your victory is sure and not too costly; you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves." - Sir Winston Churchill
A beauty of our freedom is that they get to make the choice they are comfortable with.Quote:
if students don't feel safe being in crowded situations with a highly contagious and uncontrolled virus on the loose, then it's reasonable to expect many won't return physically to BCS
Dorms, parking, cafeteria, etc. are all auxiliary services, which means their budgets rise or fall on their own. Non-academic staff may/will lose their jobs (sorry Chartwells, no profit for you), but it will not affect the education core of the University.woodiewood1 said:
If A&M loses the revenues from the dorms, parking, cafeteria, MSC sales, football sales, some student fees and combine that with th elost revenues from Texas state lands oil revenues, there will be severe budget freezes and RIF's in the Fall.
Texas state land oil revenues = PUF funds. These can be only used for capital items (unless you play games like UT). Not an immediate concern.
Reduction in state sales tax collections due to Convid-19 and the oil price collapse - these can affect the core education budget of the University. No raises, no hiring, and no new initiatives.
FlyRod said:
8 students I know personally have tested positive (two have lost immediate family members, but outside Brazos County). Whatever the decision is to keep TAMU open or not in the fall, if students don't feel safe being in crowded situations with a highly contagious and uncontrolled virus on the loose, then it's reasonable to expect many won't return physically to BCS.
What??
8? Where do they live?
Let's run some conservative numbers...Rapier108 said:Too many people don't care about the economic harm, no matter how bad it ends up being.woodiewood1 said:
If A&M loses the revenues from the dorms, parking, cafeteria, MSC sales, football sales, some student fees and combine that with th elost revenues from Texas state lands oil revenues, there will be severe budget freezes and RIF's in the Fall.
They literally live by the phrase "if it saves just 1 life, it is worth it."
60,000 students at A&M. Let's assume a 1% infection rate with symptoms serious enough for hospitalization (an underestimate, I believe, but you can argue if you like.) 600 students are infected and hospitalized.
Let's assume a 1% death rate from this cohort (you can argue if you like.) Six dead students.
After this happens, Aggie parents pull their kids from College Station. Because, if it saves the life of MY CHILD, it's worth it. A&M has to shut down again. BCS economy crashes.
You are partially right. People don't care about the economic harm if the price is the life of their child. People are not rational economic agents when it comes to valuing their own children, They place an immense value on the life of their own children. The survival of your business is not worth the life of their child.
This is what you are arguing against. It will be an interesting experiment to see you try.
That's 4 months from now, a lot can happen!
All I keep seeing is how all these models and all these experts have been a complete and utter joke! Add to that the fact that they are counting every death under the sun that they can get away with to their corona virus and you have a tons of people skeptical of all this drama! Including myself!
All I keep seeing is how all these models and all these experts have been a complete and utter joke! Add to that the fact that they are counting every death under the sun that they can get away with to their corona virus and you have a tons of people skeptical of all this drama! Including myself!
Andyv94, I am fairly certain they don't live in BCS at the moment. I know at least one is in DFW and two are in Houston.
8 out of 60000 students is hardly a surprise. Given spring break, St. Patrick's Day events at Northgate, etc, I suspect the number of TAMU students infected is not insignificant. Hopefully we'll know soon enough with testing slowly ramping up.
8 out of 60000 students is hardly a surprise. Given spring break, St. Patrick's Day events at Northgate, etc, I suspect the number of TAMU students infected is not insignificant. Hopefully we'll know soon enough with testing slowly ramping up.
My nephew went on a cruise during spring break to Cancun and he and his friends are good......he's a junior at A&M. Guess they are either lucky or were more careful than the rest?'
Then let's just keep A&M closed for the next 18 months. After all that is what the hardcore doomsdayers are already calling for.
Who cares that B/CS will become a ghost town by then. That one life saved is worth more than the tens of thousands of lives destroyed by the loss of their jobs and homes.
Who cares that B/CS will become a ghost town by then. That one life saved is worth more than the tens of thousands of lives destroyed by the loss of their jobs and homes.
"If you will not fight for right when you can easily win without blood shed; if you will not fight when your victory is sure and not too costly; you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves." - Sir Winston Churchill
lost my dog said:Dorms, parking, cafeteria, etc. are all auxiliary services, which means their budgets rise or fall on their own. Non-academic staff may/will lose their jobs (sorry Chartwells, no profit for you), but it will not affect the education core of the University.woodiewood1 said:
If A&M loses the revenues from the dorms, parking, cafeteria, MSC sales, football sales, some student fees and combine that with th elost revenues from Texas state lands oil revenues, there will be severe budget freezes and RIF's in the Fall.
******So none of the money collected from parking, cafeteria etc, goes to anything else on campus? Perhaps, but I would like to see the figures.
Texas state land oil revenues = PUF funds. These can be only used for capital items (unless you play games like UT). Not an immediate concern.
******PUF money is a very small amount of the revenues Texas gets from oil revenues. PUF money for A&M in 2019 was $324,000,000 . (324 MILLION) State of Texas revenues from oil lands was $16,000,000,000 (16 BILLION) If you don't think that the state losing a large portion of that won't affect A&M's budget, I don't know what to say. You can also add the loss of gasoline tax revenues due to people driving a whole lot less. BTW, A&M has played some games with the PUF money..like buying computer systems.
******* I went through three RIFs while at A&M when oil revenues dropped and it wasn't pretty. Some research departments had 2/3rd cuts in staff and other departments were terminated. Some departments cut out a lot of class sections and doubled and tripled the number of students in each class. No pay raises for severely years which caused a lot of faculty to go elsewhere (not totally a bad deal as some needed to go)
Reduction in state sales tax collections due to Convid-19 and the oil price collapse - these can affect the core education budget of the University. No raises, no hiring, and no new initiatives.
******see above comments.
Increase enrollment
Lower SAT and ACT requirements to allow more students.
Increase transfer students.. Many students want a degree from AM.
andyv94 said:
My nephew went on a cruise during spring break to Cancun and he and his friends are good......he's a junior at A&M. Guess they are either lucky or were more careful than the rest?'
Or they're asymptomatic and are passing it on.
FlyRod said:
8 students I know personally have tested positive (two have lost immediate family members, but outside Brazos County). Whatever the decision is to keep TAMU open or not in the fall, if students don't feel safe being in crowded situations with a highly contagious and uncontrolled virus on the loose, then it's reasonable to expect many won't return physically to BCS.
Then, they can stay home and open those spots to students who do want to come to A&M.
Problem solved. It's time to move on with our lives.
jja79 said:andyv94 said:
My nephew went on a cruise during spring break to Cancun and he and his friends are good......he's a junior at A&M. Guess they are either lucky or were more careful than the rest?'
Or they're asymptomatic and are passing it on.
Nice try bud, after spring break they went home since school did not start back up, they quarantine themselves for two weeks since my mom who has Alzheimer's and is battling cancer lives with my brother (their dad) she's in her early 80's.
The odds of them being asymptomatic and passing it on is slim to none.
They should get tested for antibodies. Might of been asymptomatic.andyv94 said:
My nephew went on a cruise during spring break to Cancun and he and his friends are good......he's a junior at A&M. Guess they are either lucky or were more careful than the rest?'
I would tend to go the other way. We don't need to have A&M continue on its path to becoming a diploma mill. If a student meets current requirements, then fine. But if we changed them, I'd make it tougher to get in. After all, A&M is one of 2 premier flagship public universities in Texas, and an internationally known and highly regarded research institution. Just b/c many more students want a degree from A&M doesn't mean they're going to get it (or in).legalbird said:
Increase enrollment
Lower SAT and ACT requirements to allow more students.
Increase transfer students.. Many students want a degree from AM.
Online classes is the right way to go for Fall 2020. Reassess Spring term closer to the end of the year.
Any / all sports should be cancelled or postponed. Risking your health to watch football? Yeah, that's dumb. Jobs and profit losses be damned.
Any / all sports should be cancelled or postponed. Risking your health to watch football? Yeah, that's dumb. Jobs and profit losses be damned.
For 14 days they were isolated alone with no human contact?
What is the purpose of assuming a death rate of 10X what it is for this age group?Quote:
Let's assume a 1% death rate from this cohort (you can argue if you like.
The Air Force Academy has had zero deaths from coronavirus in the senior cadets that they kept on campus but 2 suicides from the social distancing and isolation they required.
jja79 said:
For 14 days they were isolated alone with no human contact?
They were isolated at their house along with my brother, yes. Nobody left the house.
I agree that a lot can happen. Regardless, A&M is set up for online at the moment, so the only bug might be getting the NSC stuff taken care of for registration of new students but they could probably work that out too. This leaves them with some time at least to monitor how everything is unfolding over the coming weeks if restrictions get lifted.andyv94 said:
That's 4 months from now, a lot can happen!
All I keep seeing is how all these models and all these experts have been a complete and utter joke! Add to that the fact that they are counting every death under the sun that they can get away with to their corona virus and you have a tons of people skeptical of all this drama! Including myself!
Ultimately, IMO, there is less concern here for local businesses and more self-preservation by their legal team as a hedge against getting sued. That is where their responsibility lies.
With respect to "all these models and all these experts," to whom do you refer? There have been no end of talking heads, some of whom have latched onto the gravy train of appearances and are talking out of their butts.
Dr. Fauci has been the object of an intensive campaign to discredit his expertise but he knows his area of research very very well and has been honest about any mistakes that were made surrounding disease assessment. If you watched the press conferences w/the President, the doctor said the models had a range of around 100,000 to 2 million fatalities in a year/disease cycle depending upon the strategy to combat spread. The President and the doctor BOTH said they were hoping with mitigation strategies (like social distancing, etc) that deaths could be kept on the lower end of that range based on the models. As data started to come in back in February (first US case on US soil was January 19 IIRC), they spoke at a briefing and clearly stated that DATA TRUMPS MODELS. Although some folks were still out and about, a lot of people were clearly attempting to look out for others enough to keep everyone from becoming sick at once.
In other words, it's like a football game where you scout the opponent, and then during the game you may change things as more on the field information is apparent. It doesn't make you a lousy coach, it means you're doing your job.
With a lack of testing to confirm cause of death related to COVID, then perhaps it's not that different from when they have a range of deaths attributed to influenza. They don't always know for certain if it was an underlying condition, so they use a range when the season is concluded.
I misunderstood what you meant by state land oil revenues. The $16 billion includes state and local taxes on oil and gas extracted, as well as royalties on all state lands. I definitely agree the loss of those funds will affect the state budget, in the same manner as the loss of sales taxes, and these will have an effect on A&Mwoodiewood1 said:lost my dog said:
Texas state land oil revenues = PUF funds. These can be only used for capital items (unless you play games like UT). Not an immediate concern.
******PUF money is a very small amount of the revenues Texas gets from oil revenues. PUF money for A&M in 2019 was $324,000,000 . (324 MILLION) State of Texas revenues from oil lands was $16,000,000,000 (16 BILLION) If you don't think that the state losing a large portion of that won't affect A&M's budget, I don't know what to say. You can also add the loss of gasoline tax revenues due to people driving a whole lot less. BTW, A&M has played some games with the PUF money..like buying computer systems.
New student conferences this summer will be taking place online.Oogway said:
I agree that a lot can happen. Regardless, A&M is set up for online at the moment, so the only bug might be getting the NSC stuff taken care of for registration of new students but they could probably work that out too. This leaves them with some time at least to monitor how everything is unfolding over the coming weeks if restrictions get lifted.
https://newaggie.tamu.edu/virtual/
It will a "learning experience" making this work
To that I would add .... there's no historical data yet avail to support the model predictions for the curve flat-lining in mid-May for parts of Europe and the US. Everyone is still guessing how this plays out in the coming weeks ... and also what level of risk our society is willing to tolerate to resume normalcy.
I heard Brown University and a few others are looking at online for the fall.
Except they keep using these models to base their future deaths and infections. All of these models have been wrong from the get go! That's the problem that I have! (Just Google for virus models)
A&M Imho is jumping the shark regarding fall semester. My wife works at the university and is of the opinion after going thru the meetings that she's been involved in( at the deans level) that half want to see the campus open and the other half doesn't....or there abouts. The weed out courses and large classrooms like history, poly science etc, could be taught on line but others could be on campus if they break the number of seats down and open more sections and possibly extend the semester.
A&M Imho is jumping the shark regarding fall semester. My wife works at the university and is of the opinion after going thru the meetings that she's been involved in( at the deans level) that half want to see the campus open and the other half doesn't....or there abouts. The weed out courses and large classrooms like history, poly science etc, could be taught on line but others could be on campus if they break the number of seats down and open more sections and possibly extend the semester.
Jobs and profit losses be damned? You going to pay bills for the people out of work?
do you not know the political leanings of Crompton? doesn't take an RPTS major to know why he says the things he says.Tigermom84 said:
http://wtaw.com/city-of-college-station-update-on-wtaw-64/
At the 8min mark, John Crompton predicts that TAMU won't open in the fall, and even further that students won't be coming back until Fall 2021. He claims to be reading tea leaves, so I'm guessing he has no foundation to make these predictions. I would think our city council should be trying to find solutions to bring students back and working with the university. I don't see how many of our local businesses would survive 18mo with no students.
If Crompton is really expecting students not to return until Fall 2021, then his obligation is to take steps now to prepare for a 40 to 50% deficit. This means mass layoffs now at the city. You notice this isn't happening.
Crompton's platform is simple. If you don't do anything else today, go to 1:50 in the attached and watch. http://collegestation.granicus.com/MediaPlayer.php?view_id=12&clip_id=1411
The real question is will the rest of College Station city council go along with his mission to plant more urban forests like they did back then. Maloney will most certainly follow his lead.
The city spent upwards of $1 million dollars on his last pet project of planting an urban forest. Many of the trees have died and the maintenance costs have far exceeded the $5,000 per year he talked about. Meanwhile the city is deeper and deeper in debt and he wants to do it all over again.
Can we recall this guy? He is incredibly out of touch and dangerous.
Crompton's platform is simple. If you don't do anything else today, go to 1:50 in the attached and watch. http://collegestation.granicus.com/MediaPlayer.php?view_id=12&clip_id=1411
The real question is will the rest of College Station city council go along with his mission to plant more urban forests like they did back then. Maloney will most certainly follow his lead.
The city spent upwards of $1 million dollars on his last pet project of planting an urban forest. Many of the trees have died and the maintenance costs have far exceeded the $5,000 per year he talked about. Meanwhile the city is deeper and deeper in debt and he wants to do it all over again.
Can we recall this guy? He is incredibly out of touch and dangerous.
How long do you think it took before Crompton received a call from the A&M System telling him (nicely) to shut his mouth? Don't be surprised if he makes a public clarification.
hmmmmm. "The estimated rate of college student suicides is 7.5 per 100,000 students." so with 60k students this would be 4.5 suicide deaths. not a very different number than the 6 in your thought experiment. So why would their be a different response in sending their child to college in each example?lost my dog said:Let's run some conservative numbers...Rapier108 said:Too many people don't care about the economic harm, no matter how bad it ends up being.woodiewood1 said:
If A&M loses the revenues from the dorms, parking, cafeteria, MSC sales, football sales, some student fees and combine that with th elost revenues from Texas state lands oil revenues, there will be severe budget freezes and RIF's in the Fall.
They literally live by the phrase "if it saves just 1 life, it is worth it."
60,000 students at A&M. Let's assume a 1% infection rate with symptoms serious enough for hospitalization (an underestimate, I believe, but you can argue if you like.) 600 students are infected and hospitalized.
Let's assume a 1% death rate from this cohort (you can argue if you like.) Six dead students.
After this happens, Aggie parents pull their kids from College Station. Because, if it saves the life of MY CHILD, it's worth it. A&M has to shut down again. BCS economy crashes.
You are partially right. People don't care about the economic harm if the price is the life of their child. People are not rational economic agents when it comes to valuing their own children, They place an immense value on the life of their own children. The survival of your business is not worth the life of their child.
This is what you are arguing against. It will be an interesting experiment to see you try.
now one reason may be that every hour of every day, we are talking about the china virus and the death toll...so it is on their mind. Fear is a great gatherer of eye balls - tv, paper, message boards.
what would happen if every day the news reported an updated number of deaths by other factors.....would that change the fear perception of people - probably.
Participation trophies caused all of this
I would think that Brown being in the northeast is at a higher risk. You cannot compare that to Texas at this point. Making a decision like shutting down the biggest economic generator in town on April 19 is pure asinine behavior. First we have been bombarded with wholly incorrect models. Second we don't even know what the true CFR is. Anyone who makes such a decision in April (or May) is a fool trying to appear nuanced and thoughtful. Such a person should not be trusted with any leadership role.
I certainly agree with you that people are very bad at judging relative risks, and that more and better information might lead to better decisions. But do not underestimate people's ability to ignore reality when it contradicts their opinions and prior beliefs.Carnwellag2 said:hmmmmm. "The estimated rate of college student suicides is 7.5 per 100,000 students." so with 60k students this would be 4.5 suicide deaths. not a very different number than the 6 in your thought experiment. So why would their be a different response in sending their child to college in each example?lost my dog said:
Let's run some conservative numbers...
60,000 students at A&M. Let's assume a 1% infection rate with symptoms serious enough for hospitalization (an underestimate, I believe, but you can argue if you like.) 600 students are infected and hospitalized.
Let's assume a 1% death rate from this cohort (you can argue if you like.) Six dead students.
After this happens, Aggie parents pull their kids from College Station. Because, if it saves the life of MY CHILD, it's worth it. A&M has to shut down again. BCS economy crashes.
You are partially right. People don't care about the economic harm if the price is the life of their child. People are not rational economic agents when it comes to valuing their own children, They place an immense value on the life of their own children. The survival of your business is not worth the life of their child.
This is what you are arguing against. It will be an interesting experiment to see you try.
now one reason may be that every hour of every day, we are talking about the china virus and the death toll...so it is on their mind. Fear is a great gatherer of eye balls - tv, paper, message boards.
what would happen if every day the news reported an updated number of deaths by other factors.....would that change the fear perception of people - probably.
(It would also be easier to make an informed decision if we had lots of accurate testing, but that's a different thread.)
With respect to the suicide rate - colleges like A&M recognize it can be a problem, and devote resources to student mental health. That's an argument, then, for also devoting resources to students' public health. Also, suicide isn't something you get from someone else, so people (parents) feel they have more control over it.
As I said before, it's premature to say what TAMU should do in September. And finally, my numbers were a thought-experiment. Don't take them as a prediction, other than with 60,000 students even low probabiity risks can lead to occurrences.